Learn English – Origin of “I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”

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I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. – Confucius

What is the origin, and evolution, of this popular quote? It has a nice air of pseudo-profundity to it; one problem though: Confucius never said this. Quite understandable, since he's like the Chinese version of Einstein when it comes to quote misattributions. There's also a bit of absurdity in the first two sentences – why is sight, rather than sound, vital to memory?

Most Chinese sources would point at this alternate phrase as the origin, not by Confucius but by Xunzi, which is pretty close as he was a big Confucian:

不闻不若闻之，闻之不若见之，见之不若知之，知之不若行之；学至于行之而止矣。

A rough translation: "Not hearing is not as good as hearing, hearing is not as good as seeing, seeing is not as good as knowing, knowing is not as good as acting; true learning continues until it is put into action."

The two quotes are very similar; they both argue for the value of learning by doing, but you can see the slight differences in the process: the misattributed English quote talks about memory (forget/remember), whereas no such thing exists in the Xunzi quote.

This leads to two possibilities:

  • It was from Xunzi, just liberally translated and slightly misattributed.
  • It was from someone else; after all it's a pretty common sentiment to express.

What was the first instance of this phrase in its current form or similar, and who said/wrote it? Are there any earlier forms of this phrase that hint towards an origin?

Best Answer

As Josh61 observes (in a comment above), the saying seems to have emerged in the middle to late 1960s in the context of education. A Google Books search finds seven occurrences between 1966 and and 1968—virtually all in the context of education—and nothing prior to that. I get the impression that the quotation, unearthed from an ancient Chinese source or not, was adopted as a slogan by the "learning through experience" movement in pedagogy.

Here is how the first seven Google Books matches look. From John Williams, Mathematics Reform in the Primary School: A Report of a Meeting of Experts Held in Hamburg during January 1966 (Unesco Institute for Education, 1967) [combined snippets]:

It makes the case for change and refers to such matters as classroom organisation in helpful detail. The title is taken from the Chinese proverb: "I hear, and I forget/I see, and I remember/I do, and I understand."

From Froebel Journal (1967) [combined snippets]:

A group of scientists went to the river yesterday. Where there was a shrimp among the collection in the aquarium, there is today a collage in shades of blue and green, a graph measuring the flow of the river, a section of the river bed, leaf and stem rubbings of water-side plants and a clay image of a shrimp. The separate threads of art, mathematics and science have merged. The resulting yarn is stronger and more lasting — learning through experience.

I hear and I forget, I see and I know, I do and I understand. This was the theme of this year's course. Yes. We heard and forgot, we saw and we knew. And the breath-takingly vital work to be seen in the studio today proves conclusively that we did and understood.

From Official Report of the Semi-annual General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (1968) [combined snippets]:

May I challenge you in the words from the epistle of James to be "doers of the word, and not hearers only" (Jas. 1:22), remembering: I hear and I forget; I see and I remember; I do and I learn. Second Day Others then will follow your example. Teaching will improve. Commandments will be lived. Lives will be blessed.

From Triad: Official Publication of the Ohio Music Education Association (1968) [combined snippets]:

As always, this proverb is an excellent teacher's guide: I hear and I forget/I see and I remember/I do and I understand.

From The Photographic Journal (1968) [combined snippets]:

let me remind you of the Chinese proverb: "I hear and I forget; I see and I remember; I do and I understand."

THE NEWER VISUAL AIDS AND THEIR USES

The overhead projector might be looked upon as the twentieth century version of the old chalkboard. Because it offers a wide scope for invention, while providing a basic service in the classroom, the...

From Independent School Bulletin (1968) [combined snippets}:

Patricia Davidson opened her talk by emphasizing that a Math Lab is not a place but an approach to the teaching of mathematics, and that a school should not feel that the lack of a spare room should prevent its undertaking Math Laboratory work. She quoted Joseph Zimmerman in a statement in which he said that a Math Lab is a state of mind which is questioning and exploring: a state of mind in which the teacher is seen as the catalyst. She also quoted the Chinese proverb which the Nuffield Foundation Mathematics Project has adopted as its motto: "I hear, and I forget; I see, and I remember; I do and I understand."

And from Edward Buffe, Ronald Welch & Donald Paige, Mathematics: Strategies of Teaching (1968) [combined snippets]:

How, when, and why sensory-perceptual materials are used by teachers must be an important consideration in planning for instruction. We would all do well to remember the old Chinese motto: I hear, and I forget; I see, and I remember; I do, and I understand.

At least in the Google Books search results, Confucius doesn't enter the scene until 1972. From John Ingalls & Joseph Arceri, A Trainers Guide to Andragogy (1972) [combined snippets]:

The ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius expressed his belief in the importance of learning from experience when he wrote: "I hear and I forget/I see and I remember/I do and I understand[.]" Confucius related the acquisition of understanding and knowledge directly to living and experiencing. "I do and I understand."

It's not unimaginable that someone preparing for an education conference in the mid-1960s chanced upon a translation of the saying by Xunzi cited in the OP's question and decided to incorporate it in a presentation, at which point other educators latched onto the saying as an expression of ancient wisdom. Alternatively someone might simply have made the saying up (with or without citing it as a Chinese proverb), and it caught on just the same. Either way, once any saying becomes known as a Chinese proverb, it will almost certainly end up being attributed to Confucius before many moons have passed.

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